I know a lot of ordinary families, not royals at all that would definitly not agree on their son marrying someone who has such a past. sorry to say so but that is the truth. May be it is a matter of culture. I am from the middle east and a there, a woman should not have a past, specially if she marries into royalty!

I am from the West a country that is made up of many cultures and over here the mass population believes in second chances. Women and men here have pasts, we are not expected to be perfect (royal or not) and forgivness for a past is always an option. My husband is Indian & my I am of Ukranian/German decent (although born & raised in the west we celebrate the Ukranian traditions & culture) We have each had our cultural mountains to overcome in order to be together. My past is one of the reasons why my husband loves me & his past is certainly one of the reasons why I love him. Your past is what makes you into the person you are today, and that's a very important thing. I am sure that Hakon loves MM for this very reason.
If you have no past then how do you know who you are or what you want in life aside from the things that your family may set out for you? (which you may discover you never wanted at all?)

Even in the 18th & 19th centuries there were all kinds of royal scandals some of which included princesses. The only difference is that back then they were able to cover up these scandals much more easily. The newspapers were more respectful... & we didn't have the mass media that we do today.

Lashinka,
I'm totally opened to you thinking this way and that it is relatively common nowadays but I cannot help but thinking that way. To us, Middle easterns, a women, specially a Princess should behave according to religious and traditional morality and should definitly have no scadalous past behaviours.

I guess my point was
love sees no royalty, undesirable pasts, colour, or culture.....
This seems to be the case for Hakon & MM
I'm sorry I still don't agree but respect your opinion.
Let's end our discussion on this
Thank you for the intresting chat.

Marie Chantal is a Princess. She received the title (albeit complimentary) because she married a Prince. Not being of reigning royal family doesn't make one any less royal. It simply means that the government of your country is no longer a functioning monarchy. Your family lineage and bloodline have not been taken away.

Does that mean all the the descendents of all the defeated rulers of the past are royals as well? Wow, that would make a lot of royals today!

I guess my point was
love sees no royalty, undesirable pasts, colour, or culture.....
This seems to be the case for Hakon & MM
I'm sorry I still don't agree but respect your opinion.
Let's end our discussion on this
Thank you for the intresting chat.

Well said ! I totally agree with you . And for me, maybe it's a little childish from me but I by far prefer princes and princesses of "fairy tales" who marry because they are madly in love with someone and with whom they live happy for the rest of their lives( it is MY idea of princes and princesses)than princes or princesses who may have( and I insist on "may") higher "moral values" and don't even know what love is ...
In addition to that, I think it's far "better" to marry someone who had an agitated past than a person you don't love and whom you are not faithful to later ... And I think some princes and even some kings are guilty for this ... So who can say he or she has a perfect past or behaviour ?

I guess the future will tell us how this one ends
here are Joachim and Alexandra who married for love....
another example of marriage of reason whith Charles and Diana, not ended well.
Marrying for love is really a Western concept. Half of the world doesn't marry for love!

Let's go back to bad tempered princesses!

I heard Caroline de Monaco is quite an evil one too from time to time. I saw her once on the Faubourg St-Honoré in Paris, she was being very rude to people looking at her. People were really mesmerized by her, being curious like any body would be when seeing a celebrity and she started talking to them in a rude manner. Could not here what she says because I was in a boutique at that point.

[QUOTE=karima]I guess the future will tell us how this one ends
here are Joachim and Alexandra who married for love....
another example of marriage of reason whith Charles and Diana, not ended well.
Marrying for love is really a Western concept. Half of the world doesn't marry for love!

Well said. I totally agree with you, Karima. You are not a naive royal watcher.

Can you tell me exactly which half of the world doesn't marry for love?

Hello Genevieve,

to answer your question, I will cite India, countries in the Arab world.
I might also cite most monarchies, until very recently, heir to the throne were to marry suitable parties to produre a suitable heir. Romantic love is a very recent concept. Even in very rich families, marriages were arranged to a particular purpose....financial, land, political,....

I think, ROyals, should lead their people. Their ancestor plotted and fought to be head of states and now, royals are much more fashion icons and simply do not understanf that they have a duty.
As for Rania, I am not sure she was poor because attending the American university in Cairo cost lots of $$$$$. :)

Rania was not at all poor, on the contrary, her parents were refugees, but really wealthy ones, she was studying in Cairo, during Gulf War, she went then to live in jordan where she soon found 2 , first 1 then the other, excellent jobs- when she was a kid in Kuwait, she attended the best schools, such as the American HS.

I was not too keen on talking about her, the subject of MM has been brought on and is monopolizing this discussion. I was merely talking about Princesses in general.
In any case, to me, Marie-Chantal is not a Princess, she is not from a reigning family.
Also, How did MM learn form her past mistakes? How is she a role model? I mean, the fact that a C prince married a commoner is no news, many have done it in the past and it is great.
I don't see any difference between MM and Stephanie of Monaco. The flying incident is relevant to me because I sincerely believe that she was scared.

PS: Eliza, this is an amicable discussion :0 :)

I see a huge difference between MM and Stephanie of Monaco. Stephanie was born into the "royal" life and couldn't handle it. Whereas MM has one son out of wedlock, Stephanie seems to enjoy having her children the same way-several. Stephanie one would think would know much more about manners and decorum and would rise to the ocassion and conduct herself accordingly, but she has not. Also, her sister Caroline has been pregnant twice herself before marriage and let us not bring up the fact Caroline and EA's former wife were the best of friends before....well, you know.

Therefore, if these two young women can have wild pasts and make many mistakes even after being born into the Princely Family, then why is it so hard to accept that MM had a child out of wedlock? It would be the same as saying that the behavior of the Grimaldi Princesses is irrelevent and we should dismiss it because they were born Princesses. That it is not fair. They all made bad mistakes and that comes with life and being a human being.

__________________"Always do what you are afraid to do."- R.W. Emerson

No Stephanie is not CP but Princess Caroline is now the hereditary princess of Monaco is that not crown princess? Are her prior actions to be excused?
In my opinion her actions could be deemed worse because she was well aware of her position as princess and 2nd in line to the throne along where as MM had no idea she would meet the CP one day, marry him & possibly become queen one day.
Personally I think each of this women are remarkable princess' & do not judge them on their pasts.
Just a question....:)

Whereas MM has one son out of wedlock, Stephanie seems to enjoy having her children the same way-several.

Had never thought of things this way before but you are absolutely right. All three of Stephanie's children were born out of wedlock. She did marry Louis and Pauline's father but after they were born, and she never married Camille's father, which is why she can't even be in the line of succession.

to answer your question, I will cite India, countries in the Arab world.
I might also cite most monarchies, until very recently, heir to the throne were to marry suitable parties to produre a suitable heir. Romantic love is a very recent concept. Even in very rich families, marriages were arranged to a particular purpose....financial, land, political,....

How recent is recent?

I read William Shakespear and it seems that they were talking about romantic love back then. That is back to at least, what? The 15th, 16th century?

Arranged marriages and marrying not for love may be common in some parts of the world, but marrying for love is very much the norm in the rest of the world. You can't make such a general sweep as to say that most marriages are not born out of love. Not unless you can provide me with a credible source and the proper statistics to say that 77% of marriages in 2005 are arranged. Otherwise it's just your belief or your perspective. That doesn't make it the world's reality.

Seriously if you had that kind of money and you had people doing things for you your whole life you'd be acting the same way. Regardless what anyone says money does change people. I know if got a title I would be so differint. In the end things come easy for royals they don't really have to work for or earn anything because their lives are already set unlike us normal people we have to work hard to where we want to be. Royals just have to worry about their family surviving